Two-color infrared sensor on the PbTe: in p-n junction

Abstract

A lead telluride sensor was fabricated on the base of a p-n PbTe junction created on a PbTe single crystal grown by the Czochralski technique, followed by the diffusion of an indium donor impurity into a crystal. The capacitance-voltage and current-voltage characteristics of the sensor were measured over the temperature range from 80 K to 150 K. A prototype of a high-temperature mid-IR sensor, a PbTe diode, with a cut-off wavelength of 4 μm, operating at temperatures up to 150 K, was demonstrated for the first time. The advantage of the sensor is that its operating temperature is high enough to be reached by a solid-state thermoelectric cooler. The sensor showed a specific detectivity value of 1010 cm·Hz1/2/W at a temperature of 150 K and a wavelength of 4.2 μm. The possibility to sense pulses of long-IR radiation by means of the PbTe diode was also demonstrated over the 100–180 K temperature range. For the first time, a two-photon absorption-caused photovoltaic effect was observed in PbTe at a wavelength of 9.5 μm at 150 K.